December- so far

Max turned 9 months old! His 9 month appt went great and he was pronounced 29 inches tall and a little over 22 pounds heavy. His percentiles were not particularly high this time around, but Doc said growth happens that way- fast at times, slower at others.

I have been greatly enjoying having a proper house for the holidays, even if I do not have the money to go and buy all the pretty things in stores that I want- I think I am doing pretty well with the free decorations thus far. Here's my mantle with aforementioned (on Flickr) foraged pine cones from a neighbor's yard, candles generously gifted from my sister (selahestelle), homemade snowflakes and Mardi Gras beads from actual New Orleans that a lovely friend brought back for me a few years ago.

One of my missions lately is to bring an edible to my in-laws for the holidays that will truly be appreciated, as in, they would miss it if I were to skip a year. I think I may have found the answer in cut-out cookies. This year I have made sugar, brown sugar and gingerbread and I started last night on frosting some of them. I'm a little worried that I will seem like a show off to the in-laws, but I really enjoy making them and she said I could, seemed happy about it in fact, we shall see what kind of reception they get.

My other mission which I think has resolved itself was/is Max's sleep. He had been waking up at 5 or a little earlier for a long time (maybe a month?) whereas he used to sleep 10+ hours at night he was now sleeping 9+ (way-back-when he USED to sleep 11+, those were the days.....)

This sounds fine, 9 being the minimum, but it was definitely less pleasant, and also cause for concern were his daytime naps.

Max has never been a "napper" per se. His standard nap amount for months and months was about 30 minutes. Not long at all. He would occasionally throw in some longer ones, but more often than not, I had 30 minute chunks of time to do the myriad of things I couldn't do with him in tow.

In the past couple of months he has been mixing it up. For a little while he wasn't taking enough of his 30 minute naps (2 hours naptime being the minimum). Then he was taking one long nap (an hour and a half) either for his first or second nap with the other being about 30 minutes, not an ideal nap schedule, but pretty good. Every now and then he'd take a third little nap too, which was always welcome.

Just recently he's had a few days where he "opted out" of his first nap and wasn't going down until well after noon or even 2:30!!! (the day this photo was taken)

This is pretty serious when he is waking up at 5 am. This was the day he fell asleep in the moby wrap when we were walking back home from a playdate.

So, I was worried that I maybe needed to enforce some kind of scheduling or be tougher on him for naps or something, but he has now turned over a new leaf all on his own.

He's been waking up around 6 or even later, regardless of his bedtime, which is SOOO much nicer. Even though I stay in bed with him for a couple of hours after his early morning wake-up (which is nice, don't get me wrong) it is fitful little uncomfortable bouts of sleep interspersed with baby kickboxing at best.

At worst it is laying there for 2 hours not being able to get in the position you would really like to. But you have a happy warm baby next to you and it is much easier than NOT being in bed. Anywho- starting this whole thing at 6 or later is wonderful.

Also, his naps have gotten better on their own too- he's been getting more than the minimum 2 hours and has been doing great with going down.

Here he is last night- I went in to look at him (something I do every night now) and his little feet were sticking out! I thought it was so cute and funny. :)

In other news, he and I both have bad coughs with chest congestion. I am a little better today, but I think I may be losing my voice. Fun.

There's not much sadder than a baby with a hard cough- oh wait, there is a baby crying with chest congestion who makes a weird goose honk sound when he breathes in between. That's sadder.

Maxo-relaxo

In the interest of being able to leave my son with anyone while he's awake for longer than the unpredictable space between his naps I am experimenting.

I have always used nursing as kind of a sleep trigger for him because it's easy and it works. I doubt anyone presented with a nursing baby who fell asleep (or very nearly) in their arms would be able to resist just putting them down to sleep. It seems natural because it is- I'm positive this is what more primitive societies do and no one hassles them about setting up bad habits or dependencies or anything. Max and I greatly enjoy nursing and it nearly always soothes whatever might be bothering him- I wish we all could be so lucky to have something so dependably calming.

However, the problem arises of girlfriends asking me to join them for things or what have you during the day and not knowing when Max's naps will occur exactly and being pretty certain that I will not be able to be there to put him down. So, I have been attempting to put more time and activity between nursing and being put down in his crib. So far the longest he's gone is maybe 5 or 6 minute- I know that sounds paltry, but in babyland, 5 minutes is a pretty long time.

(Keep in mind this is just for daytime stuff. Nighttime he frequently will play for a little while and/or listen to Jack read before being put in his crib and it works just fine. Daytime naps have always been more challenging and sensitive for my little fellow).

I'm pretty optimistic about how things are going- he seems to be adjusting reasonably quickly and the thought of having someone else be able to put him down to sleep is pretty exciting for me. I know that I'm pretty indulgent when it comes to my son- but I'm not going to stop anytime soon. This is my little pseudo-triumph of the moment, just thought I'd share. :)

On a related note- I now have to be concerned for his little teeth though and that throws another wrench into things. Sometimes I rub his teeth with with some clean fabric or something after he feeds but I don't really know what to do yet for two teeny little teeth. Our 9 month appt is coming up on the 2nd though- hopefully I won't do any damage before then. :)

House, Halloween, Huge little boy

Okay- so we're deliriously happy in our new place and there are so many projects on our list you wouldn't believe. I plan on making a list of all the handyman tasks that Jack accomplishes, but it's going to be a long list- so another post for that one.
This is our new light fixture in our bedroom- we got it at Lowe's and I love it- though I do want to get some etching cream or something and make the glass frosted- I find it distracting that you can see the lightbulbs so clearly.

Halloween went nicely- the babies had a great time- I look forward to next year when I will take Max trick or treating- it just didn't make sense this year- he would be tired and I didn't want any candy. We did find out that Max apparently really enjoys playing/posing with pumpkins. He kept playing with these- it took us forever to carve them- next year we will make a better effort.

We take him to Home Depot all the time- he's getting pretty great about riding around in the basket. Sadly he's really too heavy for me to carry in the moby wrap for very long anymore. I know people carry bigger kids in them- but last time I did it my back was really tired. It makes me sad though- we both really enjoyed it while it lasted. When Jack is loading up the car with whatever purchases we've made I usually nurse and/or play with Max in the car while we're waiting- here he is after Jack joined us- he likes to mess with all the stuff in the front seat.



So, back to Halloween- I felt a teensy bit lame for Max wearing a store bought costume on Halloween- but it just worked out so perfectly and it was easy- plus it wasn't some cheap plasticky crap with a logo on it or anything, just a perfectly respectable and sweet little bear suit (courtesy of Faerie Godmother Kake's industrious thrifting! Thankee!).

Anywho- he was adorable and comfy. However, the idea was to go as the THREE bears- so I did have to work up two adult bear costumes. It ended up being pretty easy- couple of shirts from Goodwill, a pair of overalls, some altered cat and dog noses from the Halloween store- etc. The most complicated part was the ears! You would think that you could purchase bear ears from a costume store- not so my friend! Devil, kitty, antennae- all manner of things EXCEPT bear ears.

So, I bought some discount cat ears from Jo-Ann and some brown fur and figured; I have a glue gun- this will be easy.

In theory it was.


Pair #1: totally covered in fur- try them on to discover that they are far too close and high on my head to look like bear ears- I look like a mouse or something.
*dismantle*


Pair #2: Decided that if I just had the fur covering really low and just barely covering one side of cat ear then extending past said ear on other side that that would work. Nope- still catty-mousey looking.
*dismantle*


Pair #3: Took covered ear-headband and hacked off the cat ears, gluing them back on lower and recovering where they used to be. The position of these is great- they're a little homely, but at that point I had stopped caring.


Pair #4: Went to make Jack's pair (hacking off cat ears is the first step) and decided to remove all the cat ear fur covering from the headband as well. I ended up really pleased with this result, so much so that.....


Pair #5: I decided to dismantle my pair *again* and redo it just like Jack's.

Lucky for me the minimum yardage I could purchase of the brown fur was more than enough to do all of this.

Somewhere around pair #3 I think, I discovered (with some cursing) that my glue gun is INCREDIBLY hot. I burned my hands in about 4 or 5 places- the worst of which blistered really badly:

I hope you can tell how ginormous this blister is- I know you're supposed to leave them alone because they're sterile inside there- but it's a little annoying. It kind of itches now- but I think that means it's healing.


Onto Huge Little Boys: My son has always been in the big percentiles. He is now 8 months old and wearing 12-18 month clothing and size 4 shoes. The last time I got any numbers on him he was over 21 lbs and standing at 28.5 inches. Imagine my dismay when I read on our carseat that it's limits are 22 lbs and 29 inches! So, we went to Babies R Us and got a new one. It goes up to 100 lbs!!!! Yippee!
On a side note- I love my Honda Element- but it is not the easiest car to use a carseat in. The suicide doors make it difficult to access the backseat without actually being back there. It's working out though- and this carseat is much easier to latch than our old one.

So, that's it for now- I'm trying to get into the groove of blogging again- it's not easy with my picture loading difficulties though. It took me probably 30 tries to get that blister picture to load acceptably. *sigh*

Grar!

So, to any of you who do read this and have wondered why no entries it's because there has been so much going on that I really wanted to document it all with the great pictures that I have and everything but my computer is evil and when I have tried to upload pictures it's so frustrating that I just give up. Plus I have a little distraction in the house named Max and he makes it pretty easy to not get back to things that I meant to do.
We're just going to fast forward on this blog and keep as givens that our move was fine and that we're happier than ever in our new home- this is my new starting point, 'kay?

I've been busy....

WE've been pretty busy lately so I haven't been posting like I should- *sorry* :(
Quick update- this is the cliff's notes version since I am still in the process of moving while taking care of a baby.
Max loves to drink out of cups and is really strong and hard to get cups away from once he grabs hold. It's pretty adorable.
He's been sleeping a little bit better and not waking up at 5 or a little before, so that's been nice. Plus we're doing a quick reassurance IF he wakes up before he should, just going in and patting him, letting him know we're still around and then leaving. That's working pretty well too.

Max had a bunch of firsts just recently and he is SOOO close to crawling- it will be any day now. (I keep crossing my fingers that he'll wait for the carpeted new home)
He has very recently started to pull up, mostly to his knees but he can pull up to his feet and is doing it more and more. These pictures don't showcase his utter glee at this new accomplishment- but he loves to do this.

He has not figured out quite yet that it's not a good idea to suddenly let go with both hands when I'm close by but it's real sweet to have him reach for me which is sort of a new thing too. While he has been standing with assistance for months and months now he just yesterday took steps while holding Jack's hands. His first "fingerwalking" was very exciting for me. It's pretty crazy to see him growing so fast. We had suspicions that he was sitting up on his own but got proof yesterday evening on our bed. He's been good at staying sitting up when placed that way for close to a month now, but now can get there all by himself!

Also, last night and this morning he seems to be doing a new trick where if I make a smacky pop sound with my lips he'll give me a big slobbery "kiss". He's done it for Jack too- we'll see if it sticks around- it's super cute. Here's a video that shows him doing this. It's not good quality because it was shot with Jack's phone- so I promise I'm not slinging my baby around haphazardly, it just looks that way because of the speed. I don't know why it freaks out right before the end either.

All this amidst lots of packing and rain and moving boxes into the rented storage unit in our front yard. Jack is being dramatic for the picture- and that's not sweat, it's rain. Sorry for the half orange upload, I don't feel like trying again.

Only about a week to go and we're very excited! I'm really looking forward to having our house "warmed" by a bunch of people soon so they can see the house before I do a bunch of stuff so they'll know what it started out like. Yay- super thrilling times!

BIG weekend!

We (my sister and I plus our children) had a playdate with our new little/big friend Jordan Junior- It was super fun and Max brought a toy to share and everyone seemed to like it. It was nice to see the lovely Petmecky ladies and start down the road of our babies being friends. JJ is funny and adorable and we discovered that he had two newly cut teeth while we were there! Very exciting. :)

Carolyn let Selah and I go through all the clothes that JJ had outgrown and in addition to some awesome playclothes that are the right size for Max RIGHT NOW, there was this little chef hat! I surprised Jack with it and we had a good laugh.

On Saturday I awoke to my husband running through the house yelling "Oh no, Oh no!" Upon rising I find that he just opened our interior garage door to find that two of our longhaired cats had been locked in there all night and had somehow managed to knock over some motor oil and were both covered in it. Lola got the worst of it. We manage to capture them and Jack is trying to rinse Lola off in the bathtub. I bring in Magneto and he moves Lola to the kitchen sink (we had put Max in his playpen). Once I got some of the oil off Mags I went to assist with Lola because as squirrely as Neto was being I knew Lola would be worse, plus she was DRENCHED while he mostly just had it on his undercarriage. Surprisingly Lola was basically inert for most of the bathing. I was so worried that this meant that she was ill, but it seems that maybe she knew we were trying to help her. At some point I called my parents because bathing each of these cats was a two person job that could go horribly wrong at any moment and we have a 6 month old to look out for as well. I felt we needed reinforcements. Max was so good though, that Jack and I had the cats washed (as good as we could at the time) and in boxes ready to go to the vet by the time that Mom and Dad got here. Big boys went to the vet, girls stayed with Max-o. The cats are fine, and my parents get to blow bubbles for Max. They brought us moving boxes, and while all of this is happening, we get our Falcon Storage Go-Mini delivered to our yard. It was a crazy morning.


This is a very cool way to move by the way- you just get this delivered, rent it by the month, fill it up at your own pace, then have them take it to your new house, you unload it there and then call them to come take it away! Awesome! Next on the agenda is meeting our friends to show them our house-to-be. We meet at my sister's house (because it's so close!) and she reminds me that some friends are having their son's 1st birthday party that day! I'd totally forgotten- add one more thing to our so far very full day.
We checked out the new digs and Max got to play on the floor, but the power was off and we were all wilting, so after a quick once over and some pictures we went to lunch- yum. :)
This kitchen shot is my favorite pic of our house to be- it looks so bright and open and I can't tell you how happy it makes me. It's not the most amazing house and it wasn't our first choice either, but it's the one that was timed right, priced right and located right and it's really growing on me. :)

After lunch, Jack and I make a quick detour to Half Price Books to pick up a birthday present for little James. When we arrive at the birthday party Max is fast asleep- I tried to get him to nap again while we were there but to no avail. He starts to get pretty cranky and tired around 6 these days and is waking up before 5!! I (so far) have not gone in his room until it is actually 5 am or a little later- but this is no fun. He's sleeping at least 10 hours still so I don't feel like I can make him wait longer and when I try to keep him up later he still wakes up just as early. Any advice?


His first birthday party to go to was reasonably successful, it's nice when you go somewhere that understands what it's like to have a baby. The hosts were very accomodating and lovely- they have so many friends with babies right now! Little James has lots of friends :)

6 months

Sorry it's been so long since my last post- my computer doesn't like to connect to Blogger very often these days. So this one has lots of photos.
Max is now SIX MONTHS OLD!!!!! This is very exciting and I am so glad that we are moving soon so that I will have big safe floors for him to explore and parks to take him to and a cousin and auntie nearby to play with! He weighs 20 pounds even (90th percentile) is 27.5" long (85th%) and his head measures 44.6 cm (75th%). So he's still real big and evenly so. It is getting harder to get these monthly shots because he likes to roll so much now- he is REALLY trying to crawl but it's a lot of coordination to put all together at once- so it's going to be a little while. Max as a 6 month old is happy and smiley, he likes to go to bed by 7 at the latest and he goes down pretty easily for naps and for nighttime. He enjoys his nightly bath and seems to like Jack reading to him as well- at least he quiets down for it generally.

As a 6 month old his personality is really beginning to show. He kindly puts up with his Mama's fashion whims,

Enjoys playing with a spare computer keyboard, (I'm going to cut off the cord, but he was attended the whole time- he likes to bang on the keys too)

He gleefully wrestles with bears,

Is getting more and more insistent when it comes to mealtime, (there is a big difference when your baby is yelling at you from when he is just expressing discomfort or frustration, you can really see the blame in his eyes).

He is apparently quite skilled at stoically avoiding feminine advances, (even from Ava Outlaw, our realtor's adorable daughter!)

So, even though he's getting so big everyday and I can really see him turning into a little boy soon (too soon) he is also still my sweet little baby, he actually curls up with a little teddy bear when he's real tired.
(I didn't intend to take a flash picture while he was sleeping, but he wasn't bothered in the least little bit)

And he still likes to snuggle up with me in wraps or in my arms- he's just starting to really hug and sort of kiss I think and it's like nothing else. Affection from an adorable baby boy of mine and my husband's making that I am lucky enough to spend every day with. Life is good.

And finally, he still pees all over us and himself sometimes (his face!) because even though my well-intentioned mother gave us "pee-pee tee-pees" he rolls around and curls up on the changing table so much that they just fall off and have never been peed on once. They have however become a favorite chewing item......

Solid foods and sleeping snags

I've been making solid food purees for Max this week and find the whole process quite enjoyable. Something about finite tasks with a specific order of operations is soothing and satisfying for me. I discovered this at my first job as a concessionist at a movie theatre when I found myself happy at the prospect of making the hot dogs. Scoff if you must, but I really liked checking the internal temp on all the franks and once they were ready loading them into the soft warm hot dog buns that had been steaming in the drawer and then putting them into their little foil sleeves and folding the edge over neatly. I loved it- and compared to most of the other duties it was positively delightful. But I digress......
So far Max has eaten avocado, butternut squash, and acorn squash. (All organic) and he has seemed to enjoy them all, (next is parsnip!). It's so easy and simple to take a cube or two out of the freezer in the morning and put it in a cup to thaw for his little "meal" later in the morning/afternoon.

He gets really messy, naturally, and makes the most ridiculous faces- you wouldn't believe. He curls his tongue forward into his bottom lip and also does the little deep cup curl with his tongue. He tucks in his bottom lip ALOT while eating and ends up with a little "soul patch" of food pretty much the whole time. Then with his lip tucked under he starts to make chewing motions but combined with a little suction so his lips pop. It's really funny- I never could have predicted all the stuff this kid does.


I shortly thereafter put his little lap table thing across the high chair but before I could he kept bending nearly double to chew on the pommel thing on his chair- getting squash all over it and himself in the process of course. I think he's teething and so he really likes to chew on just about anything right now given half the chance.

Overall the food thing seems to be a success- I know I started food a while back but we took a break because I didn't have anything organic and I kind of wanted to wait until he was closer to six months to really get going. Now he seems really pretty happy about it and reaches for food and spoons all the time- and my water.

In other news, his sleep sessions have been a little squirrely lately. Some days he'll take two one hour naps and then others he'll barely manage two half hour naps before bedtime which then is much earlier. You would think that if a baby normally goes down at 7 and wakes around 5:30 that he would sleep later if he didn't go down until 8 one night but it's not the case.

Sometime between 5 and 6 is pretty much standard for him no matter when he goes down. Usually if he goes down early he just ends up getting more sleep and that's great- but then every now and then he'll go down at 6 and then be up at 4. yuck.

We do our best to keep him up until his usual bedtime, but there's only so much distraction you can manage before he just goes to sleep on you and he'd be miserable the whole time.

And of course, last night he went down like normal around 7 but then he was up and crying at 1:09 this morning! It was such aberrant behavior for him that I figured something must be wrong or off in some way so I went to check on him and ended up nursing him and putting him back to bed. I felt a little like a pushover, but there was something about his cry that "remound" me of the time he woke up with a fever so I thought maybe it was teething discomfort that had woken him. We'll see how tonight goes......

Balloons at dawn

Max pretty regularly wakes up around 5:20 these days. Generally this is the time when I take him to bed with me for his morning meal and sneak in a little nap time for me. But since I found out that there was going to be a balloon launch at dawn on a Saturday I figured it was an opportunity not to be missed. It's an annual event and you can find out more at centraltexasballooning.com. I found out about it from a free calendar of Austin events that my sister got in her Greenling delivery and let me have.
Anywho- we woke up at 5 and got ready before Max was awake- he woke up a little earlier than normal since we were bustling around the house a bit. Then he had a little "snack" and we loaded him up and were on our way! It was very exciting and we got there early enough for a great parking spot and chatted with some other parents of a little one.
As it got brighter outside things happened pretty quickly. The different balloon teams strung their swathes of nylon through the field and the flames started going. I kept thinking someone was going to tell us we would have to go back across the road and get out of the way but everyone seemed cool with people just milling around, watching and taking pictures, it was really neat to be right in the middle of it all.

Max jumped once from the pop of flames but other than that was pretty chill and watched everything. I was glad that we could be so close because it made it easier for him to experience it.

Watching the balloons ripple and blow up was really cool- they seemed so delicate and fragile to be carrying all that weight. This is an annual event and I think it will become one for our little family as well- because free awesomeness along with a learning experience can't be beat.

I'm in love with this photo of Max- it's my new favorite. His little ever-so-slightly-raised eyebrow slays me and really makes the picture in my opinion. I also think that this face makes him look more like Jack than usual. Anywho- a good time was had by all (my parents hauled their cookies out of bed to meet us at the dam) and it definitely warrants a repeat performance. I think getting the kids up at dawn occasionally to see/do something cool is really important.

5 months old

Max is now 5 months old and bigger than ever. He was tired when I took this photo which is why he's so angry- he was only on the floor for a couple of minutes so I could get his birthday shot. He's really what I consider to be an easy baby. He prefers to go to sleep right at 7 pm, MAYBE 7:20 or so. But he does so promptly even at other houses without his bed, bath or jammies- normally only "tired crying" for maybe 5 minutes or less after being put down. Jack has started reading to him right before he goes to sleep as well- he starts while I'm nursing then I'll put an awake baby in the crib and Jack will continue reading until he gets to a good stopping place in the story and then Jack and I are regular grown-ups again. I love the time after he goes to sleep but I also miss him. Sometimes I just want to go and snuggle him again- of course I never would- but these are the desires of a new mommy I guess.

Naptimes also go well- he has a general cyclical nature of :
1. wake-up
2. play (might need to comfort nurse depending on how upset he is when he wakes up)
3.feed a little while after waking
4.play a bit more
5. nurse for comfort
6. nap for 30 minutes or so

Even when he turns over onto his tummy and gets frustrated because he can't get back over I just go in and flip him over and leave and he goes to sleep shortly after.
Of course, this is all broken up and further complicated by wardrobe changes, accidents, getting bored stuff like that- but essentially those 6 things are what happens over and over until it's time for bed. Unless we go somewhere- then things get a little off- but not too far.

Now that he is 5 months old he is getting really good at sitting and he wants to do this more and more often instead of laying safely on the floor where I don't have to watch him every second. On our bed or with a bobby on some paddy blankets on the floor are both pretty safe but with sitting comes falling. He bonked his face yesterday and got pretty upset- but he also soothes pretty quickly too- another Max bonus.


AND- he is getting really good at sitting in my opinion. I love to watch him be able to do it with no hands and adjust his balance when needed- makes me really proud. There's a video on Flickr- I tried to put it up here but it took too long.

Of course, having two babies around is extra fun- we get them together often- Dicey is learning to have gentle hands and doing really well with the cats and also Max's head- which she seems fascinated with. They are so much fun, but each of them can be difficult to hang onto. Dicey is because she is in near constant motion and tends to buck and flail about with energy glee, Max is because he's so heavy- 19 pounds is alot to lug around for longer than a couple of minutes, especially when that's mixed in with picking up and putting down that same 19 pounds. Just look at those legs!


Side note- it's pretty difficult to change someone's diaper when that someone has their foot in their mouth. (But it's still easier than changing Energy-Girl)

A couple of weeks ago Max started making this face- he sucks on his bottom lip and hums and splutters- it's ridiculous. He also has started to stick his tongue out pretty often- it's pretty pointy- I think he got that from his Daddy. Anywho- life with a five month old is pretty great- even when he grabs my neck so hard anyone else would bruise and even when I'm changing him and he pees all over his clothes and then I put him in a new outfit and he immediately spits up on that one. It all seems so inconsequential when he snuggles against me for comfort or I feel his soft little hands gentle on my arm or face, and especially when I catch his eye and his whole face lights up with a delighted smile.